Isaac Who? The More Interesting Characters in Dead Space

Let's make one thing clear from the get go; I'm a big fan of the Dead Space universe. I think it's one of the best multi-medium franchises to exist, and other game companies that try to release connected movies, comics, and books, should really pay attention. That said, the series' main returning character is the least interesting, and I'm tired of playing as him. Here's why: *SPOILER ALERTS*
I liked Isaac in the original Dead Space. Sure, he was voiceless and faceless and that made his motivation (saving his girlfriend) seem kind of unbelievable, but coupled with his occupation as an unarmed engineer (not a burly soldier or a even a baton carrying security guard) made him a kind of everyman to whom I could relate (no small feat in itself). But then Visceral decided to not only give him a voice for Dead Space 2 but make him suffer from hallucinations of his dead girlfriend. First off, suddenly giving Isaac a voice seemed to make him an entirely different character. Where he once witnessed gruesome creatures and near death with stoic silence, he now drops F-bombs at every other crashing transport ship and suicide he comes across. And the only thing more bizarre than these moments are now the ones when he doesn't speak up! At one point he sees a clearly necromorphed baby crawling to an unsuspecting mother. Does he warn her? Tell her to GTFO? Nah. He just watches her explode when she picks it up. You're a sick man, Clarke.

And then there's his girlfriend. Man is she annoying! She pops up about once a chapter to remind us how guilty Isaac feels about not being able to save her. And that gets really old really fast. To make matters worse, Isaac spends most of this game without any real direction beyond trying to find out what's happened in the last three years.

In the end, Isaac does mature as a character. He forgives himself the guilt of being unable to save the woman he loves and possibly sending her to her death in the first place. He even manages to destroy the new Marker he's unwittingly helped to create--which also makes him the cause of the events in Dead Space 2. And I fully expected and wanted him to die at the end of the game; really, it would have been the perfect ending, and Visceral still could have thrown in their sequel teaser. But no, Isaac Clarke lives to fight another day, and I'm sort of upset about it.

My favorite aspect of the Dead Space universe (the book and movie tie-ins) isn't that they try to retell anything. Sure, they might be parts of the same story, but they tell it from different perspectives. I loved not knowing exactly what happened on Aegis VII prior to Isaac arriving to the Ishimura. But I also loved finding out from the perspectives of the characters in Antony Johnston's comics, as well as the perspective of the rag-tag team of survivors in Extraction--which I also felt had the strongest story of any of the games--because these are good characters with good stories, as well. Isaac Clarke's story? I think it's over, and it wasn't as interesting in his as some of the others to begin with.